But as lurid as all those images were, they were just fresh paint splashed on more permanent images. The pictures that lingered were of home. School. The mall. Her dad’s car and her mom’s van. The community pool. The sizzling fantasy skyline of the Las Vegas strip visible from her bedroom window.

Taken all together, the pictures churning and churning in her head fed a constant slow burn of rage.

She should be home, not here. She should be in her room. She should be with her friends. Not alone.

Not alone listening to eerie noises and a squeak and a snore.

If she had been a little more careful…. She had tried to stuff the bottle of vodka into her shoulder bag, the cute one with the beadwork she liked. The bag was too small, but the only bag big enough was her book bag and she hadn’t wanted to carry it because it didn’t work with her outfit.

For that, she had been caught. For a stupid question of fashion, of looking cool.

And now…

A tidal wave of fury at her mother swept across her. It felt like she would drown in all that rage.

Her mother, that’s who she blamed. Her father just did what her mom told him to do. He had to back her up even though he was the nicer one, not as strict or as snipey as her mother.

What was the big deal if she gave Tony a bottle of vodka? It’s not like he was driving a car.

Lana’s mother just didn’t understand Las Vegas. Vegas wasn’t Perdido Beach. There were pressures on her in Las Vegas. It was a city, not a town, and not just any city. Kids grew up faster in Vegas. Demands were made, even of seventh graders, eighth graders, let alone a ninth grader like her.

Her stupid mother. Her fault.

Although it was kind of hard to blame her mother for the blank, intimidating wall in the desert. Kind of hard to blame her for that.

Maybe it was aliens and right now some creepy monsters were chasing her mother and father through the streets of Las Vegas, like in that movie, War of the Worlds. Maybe.

Lana found that thought strangely comforting. After all, at least she wasn’t being chased by aliens in giant tripods. Maybe the wall was some kind of defense put up against the aliens. Maybe she was safe on this side of the wall.

The bottle of vodka wasn’t the only time she’d snuck something for Tony. Lana had palmed some of her mother’s Xanax for him. And she had shoplifted a bottle of wine once from a convenience store.

She wasn’t naïve: She never thought Tony loved her or anything. She knew he was using her. But she was using him too, in her own way. Tony had some status in the school, and some of that had been transferred to her.

Patrick snorted and raised his head very suddenly.

“What is it, boy?”

She rolled from the narrow cot and crouched silent and fearful in the dark cabin.

Something was outside. She could hear it moving. Faint sounds of padded feet on the ground.

Patrick stood up but in a strange, slow-motion way. His hackles were raised, the fur on his back bristling. He was staring intently at the doorway.

There was a scratching sound, exactly like a dog might make, trying to get inside.

And then Lana heard, or thought she heard, a garbled whisper. “Come out.”

Patrick should be barking, but he wasn’t. He was rigid, panting too hard, staring too fixedly.

“You’re just imagining things,” Lana whispered, trying to reassure herself.

“Come out,” the gravelly whisper called again.

Lana discovered that she had to pee. Had to go very badly and there was nothing like a bathroom in the cabin.

“Is someone there?” she cried.

No answer. Maybe it had just been her imagination. Maybe it was just the wind.

She crept to the door and listened intently. Nothing. She glanced at Patrick. Her dog was still bristling, but he had relaxed a bit. The threat—whatever it had been—had moved away.

Lana opened the door a crack. Nothing. Nothing she could see, anyway, and Patrick was definitely no longer worried.

She had no choice: she had to run to the outhouse. Patrick bounded along beside her.

The outhouse was a simple vertical box, undecorated, unadorned, not overly smelly and quite clean. There was no light, of course, so she had to feel her way around, locate the seat and the toilet paper.

At one point she started giggling. It was, after all, a little funny peeing in an outhouse while her dog stood guard.

The walk back to the shack was a bit more leisurely. Lana took a moment to gaze up at the night sky. The moon was already descending toward the western horizon. The stars…well, the stars looked odd. But she wasn’t quite sure why she thought so.

She resumed the walk back to the cabin and froze. Between her and the front door stood a coyote. But this was like none of the coyotes her grandfather had pointed out to her. None of those had been even as big as Patrick. But this shaggy yellow animal was the size of a wolf.

Patrick had not seen or heard the animal approach and now he seemed almost too shocked to react. Patrick, who had leaped to battle a mountain lion, now seemed cowed and uncertain.

Lana’s grandfather had lectured her on desert animals: the coyote that was to be respected but not feared; the lizards that would startle you with their sudden bursts of speed; the deer that were more like large rats than like Bambi; the wild burros so different from their domesticated brothers; and the rattlesnakes that were no threat so long as you wore boots and kept your eyes open.

“Shoo,” Lana yelled, and waved her hands as her grandfather had taught her to do if she ever came too close to a coyote.